


Fire Magic

by Palefire73



Series: Loki Origins [11]
Category: Frigga - Fandom, Loki - Fandom, Young Loki - Fandom
Genre: Bonfire Night, Fireworks, Gen, Sparklers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-12
Updated: 2015-10-12
Packaged: 2018-04-26 03:00:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4987537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Palefire73/pseuds/Palefire73
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a wonderful firework display for the Asgardians to celebrate Winter Solstice.</p><p>Loki is entranced by one of the treats...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fire Magic

**Author's Note:**

> Almost Bonfire Night here in the UK, which commemorates the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605 led by Robert Catesby against James I of England (Also James VI of Scotland). It was to do with Catholic rights and a few other gripes. Religion, eh? Who'd have thought it.
> 
> Anyway, I digress. This firework display is on Asgard, where none of those things matter and a much nicer tale unfolds....

It was the Winter Solstice and although the nights were long and the skies crisp and clear of cloud, it was not too cold. Once the Asgardians had donned their woollen clothes and heavy cloaks, they found it was comfortable enough to attend the celebration of the end of the old cycle. From this night on, spring would be approaching, along with longer and warmer days and the emergence of new growth in the fields and woodlands. It was a celebration of optimism for the future and joy in all that the Asgardian realm had to offer.

 

A lot of effort had been put into the preparations this year as it coincided with another century of Odin’s rule. The feast had been huge and generously provisioned for everyone and had been held outside, with long wooden tables and benches set up amongst large cheerful braziers to keep away the chill. There was entertainment for the youngsters in the form of jugglers, jesters and marionette shows and for the adults in bawdy bards and exotic dancers. The King and his family had mingled freely with everyone present, reaffirming the mutual loyalty he held with the citizens of the ruling realm.

 

It had grown reasonably late for the children and a few of them were starting to have to fight off the tiredness in order to be able to continue to enjoy everything that was going on. But a few of the very youngest had retreated into their parent’s laps and were yawning widely, even nodding off. Having noticed this, Frigga had signalled the event organiser and the firework display was announced. All the children were gathered into a special area near the front where they could see better and could be looked after by their various chaperones, nurses and parents. As huge explosions of sparkling stars in a myriad of vibrant colours began in the black Asgardian sky, Frigga handed out special long thin sticks to the older children and to the carers of the younger ones.

 

“Do not put this near anyone when it is lit! Hold it at the very end and put it in this pail of water when it is spent.”

 

Ensuring everyone had understood what she had said, she then took a lit taper and began to touch it to the end of each of the sticks. The children and their carers gasped with surprise as each one began to give off a shower of coloured sparks as they crackled, and huge smiles lit up the face of each child as they were illuminated by the miniature fiery showers.

 

Frigga went to stand next to Fulla, who was holding Loki. He was absolutely transfixed by the sparkling stick his nanny was holding a little way from him. His bright blue eyes held reflections of the sparks coming off this wonderful sizzling incandescent treat. His small hands, encased in black leather gloves were clenching and unclenching in excitement as he stared, his little mouth set in a perfect ‘O’ of wonder. He reached out, “Loki?” he asked and tore his eyes away from the sparkling stick to look hopefully at Frigga, “Loki have it?”

 

The Queen hesitated. He was still only very young and although this sparkler – a Midgardian invention* - was beautiful, it could be harmful if he did not appreciate what it was.

 

“Mama.” She looked at her little boy and he turned his huge blue eyes on her, “Loki have it?”

“It is dangerous my sweet. The Midgardians have only just harnessed this power and we have to be very careful with it. Allow Fulla to hold it and you watch it. Maybe when you are older…”

 

Loki glanced over at Thor and his friends who were happily drawing patterns in the air with their sparklers under the supervision of some parents. He looked at the sparkler Fulla held just out of his reach and then back at Frigga.

 

“Loki have it?” He did not wail, he did not start to tantrum, he was simply asking for his own sparkler in the repetitive way young children sometimes did when they did not understand that the answer should really be “no”. His gaze rested on his mother as he asked and she sighed.

“Very well, but Mama will hold your hand. Fulla can hold you and we will hold the sparkler together. But not that one; it has nearly gone out and it will be hot. We will have a new one.”

 

The young Prince’s face lit up with happiness and he waited patiently as his mother ensured all the extinguished sparklers had been put in the bucket. She then gave everyone a new one and lit them, finally coming back over to Loki and Fulla.

 

“Now, my son. You hold his end. You see? Where the metal is smooth. Do not put your hand anywhere near this part…” She indicated the part of the stick coated in gunpowder, “… as that is where the sparks are made.” She curled Loki’s gloved hand over the metal stick and closed her own over the top of it, then picked up a taper to light the end. But as she brought it up, Loki had beaten her to it. He was holding his other hand towards the tip of the sparkler and he no longer had a glove on it. His fingers pointed towards the gunpowder coated tip and blue magic began to cross the gap between his fingers and the end of the firework. As the blue tendrils wrapped around it, a small glow appeared and then the sparkler burst into life, sending sparks showering out in a profusion of blues, reds and silver. Loki’s brought his hand away quickly and all of a sudden the glove was back, keeping it safe from the cold. His eyes grew wide at the proximity of the cascading glowing metal fragments and then he began to laugh at the merry display, amazed by the patterns Frigga helped him to make by carefully moving it around. Forgetting the incident with the disappearance and reappearance of the glove, she laughed along with his infectious giggling.

 

The two women got so carried away in Loki’s entertainment that they did not notice everyone else’s sparklers going out and being put in the bucket safely. Nor did they notice the children being given honey roasted pumpkin slices to eat as they watched the rest of the firework display in the air above them.

 

For they were watching their own private display. Loki instinctively felt and understood the patterns the hot fiery sparks were making, and began to imagine them taking different paths to the floor as their brief intense fire burned out. He gazed upon them and began to will them to move in ways he wanted, rather than simply shooting from the stick to fall sadly to the ground to be spent on the wet grass. Not only did he prolong their life, Loki began to draw his own patterns with the coloured sparks. And he treated his mother and nanny to their own little show.

 

Right in front of their eyes, in their little corner of the children’s area, Frigga and Fulla watched in amazement as a kaleidoscope of shimmering butterflies coalesced out of the random sparks. Instead of a shower of golden and blue fragments falling to the ground, golden bodied butterflies with incandescent blue wings took flight from the sparkler and flew off into the night sky to wend their way through the huge cascades of flowers and stars bursting into life in the firework display above them.

 

As the sparkler eventually came to the end of its much prolonged life in Loki and Frigga’s hands, the little boy pointed solemnly with his other – gloved – hand and said, “Put in bucket.” Frigga and Fulla looked in amusement at him and then Frigga picked it up so they could deposit the hot metal stick in the bucket with the other spent sparklers.

 

Eyeing up the wooden box from which he had seen Frigga take these amazing magical metal sticks, Loki turned a hopeful face to his mother.

 

“Loki have more…?”

 

 

 

* True date of invention is unclear, but the Chinese knew about gunpowder before the time of Loki's birth in the modern calendar, so I have taken a bit of a liberty and assumed their fireworks would have ranged from very small personal displays right up to big ones. The Asgardians could have refined the technology anyway :D*


End file.
